The effectiveness of Internet-based advertising depends largely on an advertiser's ability to tailor its ads to a specific user. For example, a user residing in California is much more likely to patronize a drug store with locations only in California than is a user residing in Texas. Likewise, a retiree on a small, fixed income is much less likely to be interested in purchasing an expensive sports car than is a practicing physician who is earning a great deal of money. As such, on-line advertisers are frequently concerned with gaining information about users so that they can better determine what advertisements to present, so that their advertisements will be more effective. A problem exists because advertisers usually lack information about users.
This problem is exacerbated where the terms of an advertised offer depend on characteristics of the user, such as with insurance. The rate and terms which an insurance company is willing to offer health insurance to a user can vary greatly based upon the user's present health, medical history, age, dietary and physical exercise habits, and the like. It may be that, without knowing a sufficient amount of such information, an advertiser is unable to make an offer to an individual at all. This problem may be alleviated where the user already possesses an account with the advertiser (such as where the user has a health insurance policy and the advertiser is an insurance company) and the advertiser is able to use information taken from this account to more accurately determine the details of an offer to be made to the individual.